Wings Make Their Move, Acquire Cole from Stars

One had to wonder if this year would be like many others for the Detroit Red Wings.  Would the trade deadline come and go with no action from the brain trust in Hockeytown?  We could almost hear the canned speeches of 'We like our team' or 'Our players coming back from injury, THOSE are our deadline acquisitions'.  We'd heard them all before, and no doubt expected we would hear them again.

But not this time.

In a deal that would only be considered a blockbuster move here in Red Wings Nation, the Wings have picked up big forward Erik Cole from the Dallas Stars.

Let's face it: anything more than a swap of draft picks in Detroit is blockbuster nowadays, just let me have this!

As Dallas sends Cole and a third-round pick to the Wings, Detroit sends back a pair of prospects (Mattias Jannmark and Backman respectively) and a second-round pick.

Personally? I love this deal.  Yes, we're getting a rental player--Cole's contract is up this summer--but he adds size and grit up front that we've been lacking for some time.  Yes, we have gritty guys, but Abby, Helmer et al are not big bodies, and Helm is now out for an undetermined amount of time.  Also yes, we do have some big bodies on the team, but besides Ericsson who has only recently gotten into some fisticuffs, none of those bigger bodies really throw their weight around...I mean, do I even need to bring up Franzen...?  Also? It's not like Cole doesn't produce, with 33 points in 57 games this season on a bottom-dwelling Dallas team playing most regularly with Jason Spezza and Jamie Benn.  Give him Zetterberg and Nyquist to play with and let's see what happens, hmm?

No, I think this deal will work out nicely.  We didn't lose any impact players, and we got one in return to toughen up our lineup a little, just before the playoffs.  All in all, no complaints from me.

That said: Welcome to Hockeytown, Erik Cole!

Red Wings Show True Character, Rally Past Rangers

It's got to be said, if not before then certainly now after this game: The Detroit Red Wings are a scary, dangerous team.

For anyone who turned the television off after the first 20 minutes of this contest against the New York Rangers, few could fault you.  This game had as ugly a start as we've seen this season.  The difference tonight is that the Wings found a way to shift gears and start getting it done.  Going into the 2nd period down 2-0 and looking disconnected, Detroit hit the ice a completely new team.

What began as dominance by New York quickly turned the other way as the Wings roared back with 3 unanswered goals to take, and hold, a 3-2 lead to beat the Rangers for the first time in their last 6 meetings.  It didn't even take the big guns to get it done, with the Detroit goals coming from Riley Sheahan, Luke Glendening and Darren Helm.  The Red Wings' energy corps are becoming a true force to be reckoned with.

And what about the penalty kill?  Detroit spent most of the 3rd period on the PK thanks to consecutive, overlapping 5 on 3's.  The Red Wings were tall to the task, however, with Jimmy Howard making some spectacular saves to preserve the Wings' one-goal lead.

The win was also very special for Head Coach Mike Babcock, who tallied his 500th career win this evening.  The way things are going in Hockeytown, he's got many more to look forward to, and I believe he'll remain behind the Red Wings bench for the forseeable future.

So with the win, Detroit has now racked up 37 points.  With Montreal and Tampa both losing tonight, the Wings move past Montreal into 2nd in the Atlantic Division, only 2 points back of the Lightning for tops in the Division AND the Conference!

The next match-up is scheduled for tomorrow at 5:00 ET, when the Wings travel to meet the Carolina Hurricanes.  For now, though, we can savor the feeling of a well-earned Red Wings win.

Leafs vs Red Wings

As the regular season comes to a close, we are reminded that Detroit has some new rivals after switching to the Atlantic division. One of these teams is the Toronto Maple Leafs, who the Red Wings play tonight (7:30 PM ET on Sportsnet One, Fox-Sports Detroit)

For Detroit : 

Nyquist - Zetterberg - Franzen
Pulkkinen-Andersson-Abdelkader
Weiss-Nosek-Cleary
Miller-Glendening-Ferraro

Kronwall-DeKeyser
Smith-Marchenko
Ouellet-Jensen

Gustavsson
Mrazek

For Toronto :

Leivo-Kadri-Lupul
JVR-Santorelli-Nylander
Winnik-Komarov-Kozun
Ashton-Holland-Frattin

Phaneuf-Robidas
Gardiner-Polak
Rielly-Percy

Bernier 
Reimer

Notable notes :

Weiss on the wing with Nosek, good for him! But then, there's Cleary (womp, womp)
First game back - as far as i know - for Robidas. Look for him and Phaneuf to be physical.
The Nyquist - Zetterberg - Franzen still intact, which makes me think they'll be the 1st line as the regular season starts.
No Quincey, Kindl or Lashoff! We'll see what the kids can do; excited to see the Ouellet-Jensen pairing.

The Red Wings play in Toronto tonight and in Boston tomorrow to finish up the preseason.

Go Wings Go!

Der Kaiser: Wings Re-sign Young Defenseman to 2-Year Deal

About damn time we get some news worth me writing about!!

Well, how was everyone's summer?  I must apologize to my readers, as I seemed to have dropped off the face of the planet for a few months, but I assure you it was all in the interest of me further pursuing my dreams.

...But let's be real, you don't wanna hear about that shit, DANNY DEKEYSER JUST GOT RE-SIGNED!! (If you actually wanna hear about that shit, just hit me up on Twitter)

The news is still pretty fresh, but it appears as though the young and talented Western Michigan graduate has agreed to a 2-year contract extension worth $4.375M.  My initial thought was, "Hey look! They paid him more than Kyle Quincey!" But that thought was quickly dashed when I realized we're throwing almost that whole amount at The Saboteur in EACH of his two years.  Perhaps I'll rant about that bullshit later, but let's focus on the positive side, shall we? Ah 'kay.

Let's face it, unless we have some kind of TERRIBLE case of misfortune with our up-and-coming young blueliner (Like THAT ever happens...right........??), Dekeyser is going to be our next top D-Man in the very near future.  He's already an excellent player in all 3 areas of the ice, and has a SLEW of amazing mentors in the organization to learn from.  While I'm happy as heck that Danny got signed, I--like many I noticed on Twitter--can't help but ask: Why the shit did it take THIS LONG to get a deal in place??  DK is going to be a defensive stud for many, MANY years to come, and considering that the Red Wings have never...let me repeat: NEVER...so much as attempted to fill the void left by Nicklas Lidstrom upon his retirement, a defender with this kind of potential is what we've sorely needed.  Now that we have him, we need to lock that shit up like he lives in Fort Knox.

The only real roster question left now is whether Daniel Alfredsson will be healthy enough to opt in for another kick at the Cup.  Then once that's settled, we can all pick sides and go to war about whether we think we've got a legit playoff team or if we're going to be a shit-show and miss the playoffs altogether!

Damn, I love this time of year...it's good to be back, baby.